A Study of The Origin of Pragmatism Philosophical Concept

Pragmatism is one of the original American contributions to philosophical thought. It is the topic of discussion for social history as well. This is all about big thinkers, what they wrote, and what that meant. Pierce, Holmes, etc were these advocators of pragmatism

Pragmatism begins in the late 19th century and dominates American intellectual thought. Fields like legal philosophy, philosophy itself, education, comes to dominate these disciplines as they are being formed. Pragmatism represents our fascination with practical things and a slight aversion to metaphysical contemplation. We want practical useful things in the US and pragmatism expresses this desire very well.

Pragmatism is displaced in the 1940s and 1950s, however. It is one of the key features of liberalism, however. European’s reception to pragmatism was kind of mixed. It took on a pejorative meaning because it was so peculiarly American. Pragmatism best fit the US because of our unique social conditions. They see it as being much more concerned with immediate requirements as compared to abstract moral principles. To some extent, this critique is very true. To think of pragmatism as not concerned with abstract moral principles, Europeans misunderstood in many ways.

Pragmatism ultimately, as it developed from Peirce to James, was a philosophy of utility; a utility of ideas. As a philosophical system, it opposed the ideas of Descartes. For pragmatists, the creation of truth is not an individual process, it is not an individual ego interacting with the world; instead, the search is cooperative. For pragmatists, we consent and concur on what is true. You agree to what is true because it has certain usefulness. Pragmatists do not question that they exist. This allows for a philosophy of action to be created; you have a degree of agency. For pragmatists, it about having a sense of control. For pragmatists, everything is in our control. Everything that we believe is a function of our activity.

William James uses the idea that we cannot know what God or evil exists in the world, but we can recognize that people believe that God exists to describe pragmatism regarding religion. It has a specific purpose and a specific usefulness. As an individual, you can believe God exists or doesn’t, but you can’t doubt that other people believe that God exists. You can’t escape that fact. You make a conscious act, you will yourself to believe in God because of this. This may not be a convincing proof of the existence of God, but it can serve as an adequate proof. Pragmatists described reflexive and creative action, but overall they believe in action. You can talk about whether something exists such as God, but you can remain practical by realizing that the truth may never be known about something.

The most practical and useful information about a person is their view of the universe—their sense of what life honestly and deeply means. What he means by this is that when you perceive things, do you perceive them as a whole or as a part? A rationalist believes in the abstract, in eternal principles. The empiricist is a lover of facts. In understanding how an individual perceives the world.

For instance, a rationalist would say that there is such a thing as one American character. They would believe in the monistic philosophy that all phenomenon could be reduced to one simple principle. The rationalist would show that there is no such thing as an American, but an amalgam of different groups and the experience of each of these groups is an equal explanation of what it means to be an American. This creates a plurality of entities so that those guided by the facts that you can’t deny that there are varieties of experiences. On the other hand, rationalists that are guiding by practicality, by abstract, by the timeless is that an American is a freethinking person who respects their rights. If you know that this is how a person sees the world, you have an immediate understanding of how they will filter their experience—their perspective and why it is quite different from yours. People criticize pragmatism because it appears to embrace moral relativism. However, pragmatists understand this and go with it. If our qualities are unique to us, then it is erodes the ability of others to demean what something means to us. It helps to show what people think about what the world is as compared to what it should be. If you engage the world practically, as what it is and what it exists as. If we can agree that there is no universal truth, we can accept the fact that everyone’s truth is just as good as everyone else’s truth.

Pragmatists intend to try a method for engaging the late 19th and early 20th century. For pragmatisms, there are equal truths for the very rich and the very poor. It encourages this plurality of experience. Peirce, what he tried to do is explain how we comprehend objects. When we have an object that we want to be clear, we have to limit it to the range of our experience—the real world behavior of an object. If we describe something that is hard, we know that it is something incapable of being physically reshaped. We know it hurts to get hit with them. These are all practical effects and what the concept of hardness exists as. We know what hardness is because we’ve experienced it; it is rooted in the material, not in the ideal. This philosophy of being particular. The philosophical system that Peirce tried to create reduced everything in terms of our individual experience with those objects and principles.

The word pragmatism when William James writes about how we understand certain concepts. We are again trying to understand how we know certain things—epistemology. James contributes to philosophy by rendering in the will to believe a series of choices and options. When we are confronted by an object or idea, we have the ability to determine whether it is credible or incredible. Whether it makes sense to us or whether it is unable to be believed for a certain person. For James, this shows that an object is not true because of what it is, but whether you determine it as being something that is credible or incredible. The decision to select what to do you have rendered into a system of binaries—of opposites. The living option, he said, was that it was equally plausible to be an agnostic or to be a Christian—they are equally plausible: to believe in God or not to believe in God from an intellectual standpoint. The particular believes that are plausible within a given society are their living options. We have an opportunity to make specific decisions that are avoidable. These are all logical, intellectual decisions that you have to render. You have evaluative options as well—what is a good idea, what is a moral idea. This, to James, is a personal decision. You make a conscious decision to believe something is good/moral or immoral/bad based on your decision regarding a certain hypothesis. You choose to believe things as an individual because there are decisions that are practical to you.

Jane Addams wrote an essay about what the options are for the people that she was serving. They can come or not, but if they come, they will receive help. You choose to believe that government regulation is bad or wrong, but that does not essentially make you right. It is equally plausible to conceive that government regulation can be a positive thing. Can the government be a positive agent for change? The argument for the emergent liberal state, supplemented by this pragmatic philosophy is that yes you can.

One way in which we can see the pragmatic impact in how it influences the particular is how it influenced what law meant. Oliver Wendell Holmes was a member of the metaphysical club. Holmes was popular with progressives and reformers. He believed that the law is never delivered through abstract principles of justice. Decisions are made in court cases based on the merits of each individual case and past precedent. Justice is made in every decision. There is no abstract quality, but rather the experience. We are all individually involved because we have our own individual tastes.

To Oliver Wendell Holmes, the outcomes of cases arrive through practical principles. You go to school for law because you are acquiring particular experiences and knowledge. Lawyers are paid as advocates for defenders because of their experience with the law, but not because of their understanding of the abstract quality of the law. You decide cases based on practical outcomes. Holmes did not believe that there was no logic in law, but what guides it is experience. Philosophy of pragmatism is, in short, to be no philosophy at all. As James understood it, it is the rational outcome of our experience and the guide of practical decision-making. We do not steal because we have a sense of practical ramifications--what will happen if we do steal. There is no abstract moralism. It is the practical realization of the eminence of punishment that keeps people abiding to social standards. There are consequences and this is what makes sure that we cohere as a group.

Finally, we can see pragmatism manifesting itself in the way that we teach people. John Dewey was guided by practical experience and particular experience in understanding human activity in society. It was important for Dewey in understanding psychology. How do we learn how to do things? We learn how to do things through experience. This is a breakthrough for Dewey in pedagogy--how we teach people. He says that students learn most effectively by doing. They learn through experience. The difference between knowing things and doing things for Dewey is indivisible. We continually expand what we know by building on what we learn. You want them to learn how to become learners. Learning and doing are one and the same. We should allow students to be doers and active in their education. You have to have experience confirm what you know. The entire point of pragmatism as a philosophy was to allow people to engage the world in a way that empowered them and validated their experience. For the pragmatists, there is no bad experience because, to some extent, it is all-instructive.

It helped really propel and do away with religious intolerance in the US. By empowering individuals and empowering their experience, making that a central form of knowledge and highlighting their ability to decide what is credible or incredible, it helped to justify a new conception that is useful for liberals. Pluralism--a variety of experience. That was the thing that the government was an important institution to protect. In a peculiar way, the philosophy of pragmatism was a sense to react as they integrated into this industrial system.

Liberalism is another response to this industrial system to respect these pluralities.